Caroline Lucas
Main Page: Caroline Lucas (Green Party - Brighton, Pavilion)
Michael Fallon
I am sure that those who support my hon. Friend will be grateful for that explanation. The quotation I have seems pretty clear to me, but it is for him to explain it. If he is not so sure any more, why should the rest of us be so sure?
I would say to my hon. Friends that they should let the Opposition, as they always will, be opportunistic. Let the Opposition please the lobbyists by suddenly supporting a target that they never endorsed in 13 years in power. I ask those of us here who share the responsibility of government to be a little more careful not to risk higher bills now for our hard-pressed industries and constituents, not to force out generating plants before we have the new investment that the Bill will deliver and, above all, not to drive up costs for those industries struggling to compete against lower energy costs abroad.
Let us have economic and industrial policy that is coherent, and energy policy by design, not decarbonisation by dogma or by default, which can only drive our industries offshore. There is a better way forward, and it is in the Bill. Let us be the first Government ever to enable a legally binding target to be set at the right time: when we set the fifth carbon budget in 2016. We can then better assess the real prospects and costs of carbon capture and storage; properly measure what is happening to the whole economy; and better judge the transition to a greener future against the costs that our consumers and businesses must bear. I urge all my hon. Friends not to rely on blind faith, but on the practical steps that we are taking in the Bill to decarbonise our economy while ensuring security of supply at least cost to our constituents.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
There are many reasons to support the decarbonisation amendments, and many hon. Members—most recently the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner), who is just leaving the Chamber—have set them out with great expertise and eloquence. From a security perspective, I want to underline that the stakes could hardly be higher. It is clear that those who will suffer the most harm and hardship from the impacts of climate change are often the poorest and most vulnerable, here in the UK and globally—those who have contributed the least to the problem. In that respect, this crisis is not unlike the banking crisis.
As many business leaders and experts such as Lord Stern have said, there is no business as usual at all in a 3° or 4° warmer world. A couple of years ago, at the launch of the UK’s climate adaptation plan, the big idea was managing the unavoidable and avoiding the unmanageable. “Avoiding the unmanageable” means keeping global temperature rises below 2°. For years, that line in the sand has been recognised by the UK and most other Governments, and enshrined in legal documents under the auspices of the United Nations framework convention on climate change and the G8. That is the basis for the UK’s Climate Change Act 2008, and our carbon budgets, which the policies in the Bill will, or perhaps will not, deliver. Internationally, citizens and Governments of low-lying island states risk their entire nation being literally wiped off the face of the map, even with a 2° rise.
David T. C. Davies
I read recently that Tuvalu would be wiped off the face of the earth within 10 years if we did not do something about global warming. The only problem is that the article was 10 years old, and all those islands are still there. Is this not just more exaggeration from those who want higher electricity prices as a result of decarbonisation?
Caroline Lucas
I do not really know where to start to respond to such an ignorant intervention. I will not even bother wasting my time with it.
As I say, a couple of years ago, we were talking about the fact that entire nation states face being wiped off the map. If the hon. Gentleman cared to look at the situation in Tuvalu, he would realise that it is getting more and more serious. If such a real and present threat were facing the UK, would we not join their calls for much more dramatic emission reductions, to keep the global temperature rise to less than 2°—perhaps to 1.5°? Would we not go, as many nations are, for 100% renewable energy over the next few decades?
I cite those statistics because I want to remind the House what we are talking about. Much of the debate so far has rightly been about the cost of decarbonisation, and about the targets and so on, but the bottom line is that what we are discussing is literally life and death. People’s life or death is at stake today. That is why we need to use this opportunity to make sure that the Bill is as ambitious as it can be.
I have talked about what I would regard as the moral case for swift action. We have heard a lot about the economic case. There is no shortage of companies telling us that a decarbonisation target is essential. The joint letter of more than 50 Aldersgate Group members, for example, said:
“the Government’s perceived commitment to the low carbon transition is being undermined by…the absence of a specific carbon intensity target.”
Many other companies would say the same.
I would like to focus on the impact internationally of what we do at home. A domestic decarbonisation target is crucial if the UK is serious about securing a global deal on climate. We hear a lot from the Government about the need for international action, and it often sounds as though they are saying, “Let’s wait until there is international action before taking action here at home,” but as someone who would know about this, John Ashton, would say, action at home first is absolutely critical if we are serious about getting global agreement.
John Ashton, as many hon. Members will know, was the Government’s special representative on climate change, a Foreign Office diplomat who has spent many decades working on the subject. Last month, he talked about the need for global agreement, explaining:
“British diplomacy can influence this, perhaps critically; the argument that we are just too small to count is nonsense. But our diplomacy starts at home.
I have been personally involved in British climate diplomacy for most of the last 15 years, at the heart of it for much of that time. Nothing that we accomplished could have been accomplished if we had been faltering at home as we are now. You cannot expect others to act as you ask, or even listen to what you say, if you are not doing yourself what you want them to do. If we in Britain appear to be giving up…we will be out of the game. That is why I spent so much of my time as a diplomat, close to half of it, on domestic policy.”
Let us not think that domestic policy and global policy are not linked. They are essentially linked. If Britain is to maintain its position as a real leader on climate change, we absolutely have to act at home. The decarbonisation target is a crucial part of that.
Indeed, I would say that the target does not go far enough, although of course I will support it this afternoon. Let us remember the context: a target of 50 grams of carbon per kWh by 2030, which is what the amendments that we are considering are essentially proposing, is absolutely the minimum that we should seek to achieve. The Climate Change Act 2008 and the carbon budgets that flow from it reflect the overwhelming consensus, stated many times by the Government, that we have to keep below 2° warming, but current carbon targets give us only a 37% chance of doing that. I want to emphasise that, because I sometimes think that when we discuss targets in the House, we assume that if we meet a certain target, that gives 100% certainty of a given outcome. Clearly it does not; it is about a balance of risks. How many of us would get on an aeroplane if we were told that it had only a 37% chance of reaching its destination in a safe way? A 37% chance is pretty low, yet those are the odds that we are arguing about even now.
I wish the argument was about not whether we should decarbonise straight away or by 2016, but the extent, far-reachingness, speed and ambition with which we should do it. That is the debate that we should be having, instead of arguing about whether we should be going in this direction at all. An honest reappraisal of our targets is needed, with science, and the implications for young people, vulnerable communities and future generations, at the forefront of our minds.
The hon. Member for Brent North, who is a leading advocate for action on climate change globally, raised the challenge of the need for tighter targets in his Westminster Hall debate. I would like to know his view of John Ashton’s stark conclusion that the UK could never have achieved anything close to its previous international influence against the backdrop of current policies. Credible domestic targets and action are crucial.
As well as science-based targets, we need an honest reappraisal of the role of fossil fuels and the fossil fuel lobby’s enormous influence over policy making. To say, “Gas is lower-carbon than coal, so let’s get fracking” is disingenuous at best. Gas is still a high-carbon fuel, and gas prices are projected to rise in future, irrespective of shale gas. That is according to most of the expert analysis that I have seen, certainly from independent sources without direct or indirect financial or family ties with Cuadrilla and the wider fracking fraternity.
Through the Bill, Ministers are putting in place mechanisms that offer vastly greater support to nuclear power than to renewables. The Bill is about gas and nuclear; it is not sufficiently about a low-carbon future. Through it, Ministers are offering long-term guarantees for high-carbon gas generation until 2045, and a way for the same gas companies that are putting up bills and raking in profits to take even more money from taxpayers and bill payers through the capacity mechanism. The Secretary of State is offering long-term guarantees and assurances for high-carbon gas generation, and tax breaks for fracking. Ministers have not chosen to give anything like a similar degree of certainty for wind, wave, tidal, solar, biomass, hydro or geothermal power—nothing beyond 2020. That is made even worse by the Government’s opposition to proposals, backed by industry, for 2030 targets for either renewables or efficiency.
The Government had the opportunity, in the Bill, to drive a radical transformation in ownership and control of energy away from the big six to communities, localities, individuals, private companies, public authorities, joint enterprises and co-operatives. Instead, they have chosen a support mechanism that only really works for the likes of EDF, npower, Centrica and E.ON, which will tighten their death-grip on us.
In the light of these actions, it looks extremely unlikely that the UK stands much of a chance of achieving the carbon reductions necessary, or even of remaining on track to meet the 2050 target without a 2050 decarbonisation target. I end with another quote from John Ashton. When asked for his view on the decarbonisation target, he stated:
“I can’t myself see how any MP who votes against the target will thereafter be able credibly to claim that they support an effective response to climate change.”
I know that will not bother some in the House, but I hope that for many other Members it will concentrate their minds on the vote.
Caroline Lucas
I certainly support the amendment, but I wonder why the hon. Lady limited the threshold to 10 MW. The Energy and Climate Change Committee talked of 50 MW, and many non-governmental organisations have talked of more than 10. I think it would be useful to convey the idea that “community” means more than just “small”.
Luciana Berger
If the hon. Lady looks at the amendment, she will see that it refers to
“not less than 10 megawatts.”
It does not limit the threshold to that level.
I listened carefully to what the Minister said about his commitment to “active consideration”, a phrase that he used many times. He used the same phrase when we discussed a similar amendment in Committee four months ago. If the Government really want to deliver the community energy revolution to which the Secretary of State has referred, actions must speak louder than words. The hon. Member for Edinburgh West (Mike Crockart) expressed his support for community energy, and I hope that he will join us in the Lobby to support amendment 1. Unfortunately, the hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) is no longer in the Chamber, but I noted his aspirations for community-generated energy in Bromley, and I hope that he, too, will join us in the Lobby.
I urge Ministers to support our amendment, and I urge the House to divide on the issue if they will not do so.
Dr Whitehead
My hon. Friend is right. Indeed, there are companies in the UK, such as Ecotricity, which have not exactly involved themselves in crowd funding, but have engaged in bond arrangements for the development of their low-carbon power. Even if such a source of funding is available, if the deal for the subsequent sale of the energy is so disadvantaged by a contract for purchase that shaves off the reference price or makes arrangements that are extremely disadvantageous to the ability of that company to sell its energy into the market—while at the same time those potential purchasing companies take advantage of their vertical integration by providing routes to market for their own generation at different costs and under different arrangements—the future market will be very distorted indeed.
I welcome the Minister’s saying that the issue is being actively considered, that he understands the problem at the heart of the GPAM proposals, and that he is actively in dialogue with industry on possible routes to solutions. I look forward to proposals in another place to address the issues. It is essential that they are addressed before the Bill completes its passage, so that the market that we produce as a result of CFDs is fair for those participating in it and produces the varied and pluralistic market that we want for electricity generation, particularly low-carbon energy generation, in the future.
Caroline Lucas
I want to say a few words about the amendments in my name, starting with new clause 2, which deals with the strategy for electricity demand reduction. The clause sets a clear ambition for 2020 and 2030, using figures published by DECC, alongside the electricity demand reduction consultation, and requires the Secretary of State to have policies that get us there.
I was a little disappointed that, in response to the amendments that I have tabled, the Minister on many occasions indicated warm sympathy but not action to achieve the aims. Willing the ends but not the means creates a nice warm fuzzy feeling, but does not change the menu of targets and strategies before us. That particularly matters when it comes to electricity demand reduction, because there is so much scope for doing so much more in this area. No matter how sympathetic we feel to that aim, however, unless the legislation is in place, we do not have the clarity, certainty or confidence that action will be taken. We have seen all too often how, in the absence of firm targets and strategies, Governments fail to put in place adequate polices or resources to achieve things. My worry is that in many respects elements of the Bill are more like a wish list than a strategy.
Caroline Lucas
I refer the hon. Gentleman to a report by McKinsey on DECC’s website, which sets out exactly how we can reduce electricity demand by 36% by 2030. That potential figure was properly referenced and much work has gone into identifying it—indeed, others have used a higher figure—but we are not even getting anywhere close to that at the moment.
The focus of my new clause is to say that that is not enough, given that those on both sides of the House, with the possible exception of the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies), appear to agree that the most effective way to tackle fuel poverty and high energy bills is to reduce the overall amount of energy we need to keep our homes warm and to cut energy waste. The new clause is straightforward and complementary to amendments 39 to 41 on demand reduction regulations.
While energy demand reduction is a bit of a no-brainer, the Government’s current approach is failing. The latest shocking example is last week’s news that the number of homes installing cavity wall insulation has crashed by 97% since the introduction of the green deal. Quite incredulously, I can say that a DECC spokesman is quoted as saying that the early signs are encouraging. I wonder what Ministers would consider discouraging and alarming if a drop from almost 40,000 cavity wall insulations in April last year to 1,138 this April is not precisely that.
For the sake of existing energy efficiency businesses that are struggling in Brighton, Pavilion and elsewhere, for the sake of families paying huge bills due to poorly insulated homes, and for the sake of the huge number of jobs that could be created in every constituency across the UK, we urgently need a serious approach with suitable ambition, a plan to get there, and that is exactly what new clause 2 would achieve.
John Robertson
I tried to get cavity wall insulation and I was told that because of my brickwork I could not have it, although I would have thought that my type of house was ideal for it. Is it not that the rules are now being adhered to by companies, whereas before they were putting it in and a lot of houses were suffering from damp as a result?
Caroline Lucas
Obviously, I am not deeply acquainted with the brickwork of the hon. Gentleman home, but I find it slightly surprising that the justification that he advanced would be responsible for such a dramatic reduction. I cannot believe that quite so many cavity wall insulations, down from 40,000 last year to just over 1,000 this year, could be as a result of its having been done badly in the past. There might have been an element of that, but there are some real concerns about the take-up of the green deal and the way in which it replaced some pretty good schemes instead of building on them.
New clause 3 is about community rights to priority access to local power generation and local grid ownership.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. New clause 3 comes in the next group.
Caroline Lucas
I apologise, I thought they were all wrapped up together in one happy family.
I am delighted that amendments 42 to 46 are supported by the hon. Member for Hove (Mike Weatherley), so in recognition of that I will call them the amendments from Brighton and Hove. They are basically about decentralised energy, which was another area where the Minister said that he appreciated the direction but did not feel that action was necessary. I quote from “Power to the People—the Decentralised Energy Revolution”, a document from the Prime Minister himself:
“In other countries low carbon energy sources have led a process of decentralisation—in the Netherlands, for instance, in little more than a decade, combined heat and power (CHP) became the single largest supplier of the country’s energy needs.
I want to see a similar revolution happen in Britain.”
I want that too, but I do not see it happening unless we put the means in place. It is a real shame that that vision has gone the same way as the abandoned huskies—once hugged, now hated. Distributed generation is about producing and using energy locally.
Gregory Barker
We have a long way to go, but since the coalition came to power, hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses have started generating their own electricity—and that is only the beginning.
Caroline Lucas
I am delighted to hear the Minister say that. All I want to do is build on that wonderful beginning and make it go even faster with even more ambition. That is why I so hoped that he would support the amendments that go in exactly that direction. Seriously, I know that the Minister is deeply committed to the issue; I simply think that we could get there faster and with a bit more ambition by having a clearer strategy and focus.
Decentralised energy is not even formally defined in Government policy. I would have thought that it would be simpler if it were; that is one of the issues that my amendments would address. Of course, decentralised energy is already used in hospitals, schools, small towns and so forth, but its untapped potential remains vast. I cannot help thinking that if Ministers spent a fraction of the time promoting decentralised renewables that they spend promoting the nuclear industry, we might have a different kind of energy system today.
The amendments would create a new feed-in tariff scheme for distributed generation, with a maximum capacity limit of 50 MW. I am glad that I now understand the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger); I am delighted that the 10 MW was a bottom line rather than a top limit. The 50 MW was the level recommended by the Energy and Climate Change Committee and we should be more ambitious than the 5 MW that the Government currently foresee or the 10 MW ballpark figure from the official Opposition.
Finally, the amendments would require distribution network licence holders to play their part in facilitating decentralised energy. It is worth pointing out that a distributed generation feed-in tariff would involve no additional cost for consumers or the Treasury; it would simply provide an effective way for small generators to invest in electricity generation and participate in the market.
Again, the new clause is complementary to amendment 47 on a green power auction market and to Opposition amendment 1. I hope that the amendments can be taken together as a positive contribution to moving to decentralised energy in a swifter fashion.
Andy Sawford
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) and my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test (Dr Whitehead).
A year ago, my hon. Friend and I, along with my right hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint), wrote in a paper called “The Power Book” about the potential for community energy. We argued that as the new energy industrial revolution unfolds in this country, future technologies, new sources of renewables and low-carbon energy have huge scope to challenge the existing market, help reshape the relationships between people and power providers and create new agents of delivery. I pay particular tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test, who has been pioneering such work for some years—for example, he has championed the district heating project in Southampton as an MP and former local council leader.
I also want to mention such projects as the Baywind energy co-op in the Lake District, Watchfield in south Oxfordshire and Brixton Energy. There are increasing numbers of inner-city providers of community energy.
However, we have to be honest. The scale of such projects in this country is small compared with other countries. We should look to America, for example. Some 42 million American citizens, the equivalent of two thirds of the population of this country, are members of energy co-ops. The German example is even more impressive. Since 1990, German citizens have had a legal right to be producers and suppliers of electricity to their grid system. The big step change came a decade ago when their Government introduced a system of preferential feed-in tariffs. That transformed an energy sector that once had only four major suppliers into one that now has over 2 million contributors. It also created 400,000 jobs and has lowered prices, year on year, over the past five years.
Across the UK, local councils are rising to the challenge of transforming the energy sector. I have followed community energy projects around the country and I have profiled projects in Stoke, Stevenage, Kirklees and Sheffield. I am particularly pleased to welcome Electric Corby, which was launched in my constituency on Friday. It is a not-for-profit community interest company formed with the support of the borough council to establish the UK’s leading practical community-scale test centre for future low-carbon living and transportation and to redistribute the benefits of its labours to the Corby community. As the Minister will know, Electric Corby is funded via DECC’s Cheaper Energy Together switching competition. We welcome that support, but it is very much a local initiative.
The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change (Mr Edward Davey)
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
Let me begin by thanking those from all parts of this House and outside who have helped to strengthen this crucial Bill and bring it to this point. I thank the Energy and Climate Change Committee and its Chair, my hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk (Mr Yeo), and the informal scrutiny group in the other place for conducting invaluable pre-legislative scrutiny of the draft Bill. I also thank the individuals who gave oral evidence to the Committee, as well as the organisations that took the time to provide expert written evidence and recommendations.
In particular—I think you will agree with me, Mr Speaker—I could not allow the Bill to leave this place without thanking my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr Hayes) for skilfully guiding the Bill through Committee. I am told that at one point in Committee he managed to compare himself to Henry VIII and Indiana Jones in the same breath—I am not sure whether he has told his wife. I for one salute his unique style in promoting renewables.
I also want to thank the Ministers of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change for their hard work. It would be remiss of me if I did not also mention my hon. Friend the Member for Wealden (Charles Hendry).
On the Opposition Benches, the hon. Members for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Tom Greatrex) and for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger) have been skilful and insightful. I am grateful that they have applied the principles of constructive opposition to the Bill’s scrutiny rather than the principles of destructive opportunism, which are all too often applied in politics generally—by people of all political colours—but which are all too often not in the national interest. Let me take this opportunity to remind the House why the passage of the Bill is so important and so firmly in the national interest.
Caroline Lucas
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for thanking everyone for contributing to making the Bill stronger, but I wonder how he thinks that it has been made stronger, given that, as far as I can see, not a single Opposition amendment has been accepted, either in Committee or on Report.
Mr Davey
The hon. Lady might not have noticed that the Government have responded to a lot of the debates and tabled a lot of amendments on everything from electricity demand reduction to decarbonisation. I will come to those amendments shortly.
Electricity market reform, which is at the centre of the Energy Bill, is the result of four imperatives: the need to power the country; the need to protect the planet; the need to insulate consumers from rising energy bills; and the need to get the economy moving. With demand for electricity set to increase, and around a fifth of our power plants set to close, we will need to attract £110 billion of new investment in electricity and grid infrastructure in this decade alone to ensure that we have enough reliable capacity to meet demand. The Energy Bill will do that.
The Climate Change Act 2008 commits the United Kingdom to an 80% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, so we need specifically to encourage investment in low-carbon energy generation: renewables, carbon capture and storage, and nuclear. The Energy Bill will do that. With global demand driving wholesale prices higher, and with that in turn driving domestic energy bills higher, we need to create a more diverse and competitive energy market to help to cushion consumers from volatile fossil fuel prices. We also need to ensure that they are getting the best deal from suppliers. The Energy Bill will do that.
By facing up to the need to invest in low-carbon energy infrastructure, we will support economic recovery too. The trebling of support under the levy control framework will mean £7.6 billion a year by 2020 to support low-carbon technologies, including infrastructure projects that are ready to go now, supporting jobs, supporting communities and providing prosperity. Projects worth over £8 billion are already in the planning pipeline. Electricity market reform could support as many as 250,000 jobs in the energy sector. The Energy Bill will support green growth. That is why I am pleased that the Bill, as strengthened in Committee and on Report, benefits from a general level of cross-party support in the House.
I want to reflect on some of the ways in which the Bill has been further strengthened in this House. Let me start by dealing with the decarbonisation target head on. No party in this House—not the Liberal Democrats, not the Conservatives, not Labour, not the nationalists, not even the Greens—had a commitment in its 2010 manifesto to set a 2030 decarbonisation target during this Parliament. Nor has any other country yet set a power sector decarbonisation target for 2030.
I can understand the argument that an early decarbonisation target could provide extra certainty for large, long-term projects in the UK power sector, particularly in the supply chain. However, there is also logic in the consistency of setting the decarbonisation target for 2030 at the same time as the fifth carbon budget, which is scheduled for 2016—still 14 years ahead of the target date. By comparison, the 2020 renewables target was set in 2008, just 12 years from its target date.
If anyone still doubts my commitment, or that of this Government, to decarbonisation, they should consider the decision that we have just made on the UK’s position for the EU’s 2030 greenhouse gas target. In the context of winning an ambitious global climate change treaty, we will be arguing for a 50% reduction target in the EU. That is the most ambitious position of any member state, and I am proud that this Government are leading the way on climate change action.
Let me turn to other areas of the Bill—first, to contracts for difference. Long-term electricity price stability will be provided through CFDs and will be a key part of the new low-carbon electricity market. As such, the Commons Committee quite rightly looked at the nature of the CFD counterparty body and made a number of recommendations. In response, the Government have clarified the Bill’s drafting to make the policy intention more explicit.
Caroline Lucas
I am sorry to sound a negative note, but to my mind the Bill falls well short of what is needed. Ministers have had many opportunities to improve the legislation for the sake of our economy and those struggling with high energy bills, in order to create many thousands more jobs and, crucially, to demonstrate that we politicians are up to the job of tackling the climate crisis with the urgency and ambition required.
The Bill could have demonstrated that politicians understand the risks of locking the UK into high-cost, high-carbon gas generation for decades to come; that we listen to and act on scientific advice on the urgency of action needed to avoid irreversible climate change. The Bill simply does not go far enough. There are some positive aspects: for example, I welcome the emissions performance standard, but it is too weak, and it opens the door to a new dash for gas. As a result, we have not seen the last of people turning their backs on the politicians who listen to the fossil fuel lobby rather than climate scientists, and people instead taking action themselves in the name of what they see, and the science says, needs to be done—people such as the brave, peaceful protesters who occupied EDF’s West Burton power station last year.
If we are to avoid catastrophic climate change and the worst impacts here and elsewhere, in terms of water shortages, flooding, food price rises and drought, it is clear that around 80% of existing fossil fuel reserves need to stay in the ground. How can we hope to leave that unburnable carbon in the ground if we cannot even agree a decarbonisation target for 2030? I am not looking forward to writing yet again to hundreds of my constituents to tell them that the decarbonisation target has been rejected, against all common sense. Frankly, I find it almost unbelievable that so many Liberal Democrats voted against their own policy.
It is a scandal that the Bill does not have more ambition when it comes to renewable energy and energy efficiency. Instead, it will facilitate vast subsidies to new nuclear power stations that we do not need. There are plenty of records of how we can reach our climate change and decarbonisation targets without new nuclear. New nuclear, with vast public subsidies to support it and no real public or parliamentary scrutiny, is at the centre of the Bill. Crucially, that is diverting investment away from faster, less costly, more jobs-rich and more secure means of meeting electricity needs, including through harnessing the UK’s huge renewable energy resource. The enormous potential of energy efficiency and demand reduction is also overlooked, with weak amendments from the Government convincing nobody. That ignores the widespread consensus that these are the cheapest, quickest, and most effective ways to protect householders from high energy bills, and to cut emissions.
Perhaps most of all, I am disappointed that the Bill simply fails to have a vision of a different energy future. It simply entrenches the big six energy companies and their death-grip on the UK’s energy system and on the many households in Brighton, Pavilion and elsewhere who are struggling to pay ever higher energy bills. It reinforces the centralised electricity system, in which people are just passive consumers, constantly ripped off, whether or not they switch from npower to EDF to E.ON, because essentially they are all the same. Contrast that with a place such as Germany, where only 13% of the country’s 60 GW of renewable energy is owned by big energy companies. The rest is owned by households, communities, development trusts and farmers. Fully 50% is generated by community-based projects.
The Bill could have supported projects such as the Brighton Energy Coop, releasing a new wave of co-operative and community energy projects where people are so much more than passive consumers—they are active producers of energy. It could and should have set us on a path to a radically different, more democratic energy future by giving smaller independent generators and community and co-operative energy schemes fair access to the market, where people own and generate their power on a serious scale and benefit from lower energy prices as a result. I am very sorry that the Bill has not taken those opportunities.
Andrew Percy
I was not intending to speak, but I have been moved to do so by the speech made by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas), who attempted to present those of us who oppose the decarbonisation target as in some way anti-renewable. I voted against the target not because I am anti-renewable but because I am concerned about the bills paid by those who sent me to this place and the impact of onshore wind developments in my constituency.
In the Humber, we hope to benefit from significant investment by Siemens and others in offshore wind. We all stand behind and support that, if for no other reason than it is a job creation scheme. I hope we will see British employers such as Tata—I got things slightly wrong earlier in calling it a British company—benefiting from that. We want that development and those jobs to come to the Humber. However, the attempt to paint those of us who have opposed the decarbonisation target as anti-renewable is not fair at all.
Many of my constituents work in the coal and gas sectors. A large number work in coal and gas generation and some even work in coal mining. I think about their jobs and rights when we debate our energy market. It is not yet clear how the decarbonisation target would be hit or how carbon capture and storage technology could contribute to it. In my side of the constituency, at Drax, a lot of money is going into trying to develop clean coal technology. We want that to be a success. Perhaps in a couple of years’ time, when that is scalable and deliverable, I will be in the Lobby with the hon. Lady.
Caroline Lucas
The hon. Gentleman has not been in the Chamber in the past two days, but over and again those on this side of the House who have been proposing and supporting a decarbonisation target have been able to demonstrate that it will precisely lead to lower fuel bills for consumers. It is precisely gas that is leading to higher bills. Will he not base his statements on the facts?
Andrew Percy
I have followed this debate closely both inside and outside the Chamber, and I am afraid that it has not been demonstrated at all that the target could be set up cheaply. If that were so, it would already be being done. I am concerned about the impact that such a target would have not only on bills, but on England and our countryside. I represent a constituency where people are very concerned about onshore wind turbines. The hon. Lady represents a more urban area, so perhaps she does not have to face what I have to.